Sunday Hania and I went to the Yellow Green Market, where Colombians were grilling meats out in the parking lot, Trinidadians were selling roti, Mexicans were making tacos, Jamaicans were heating meat patties, Venezuelans were filling arepas, Brazilians were baking cheese bread. There were tiny Thai lunch places and Southern barbecue counters and even a booth advertising “German street food.” Hania spoke Russian with the young man who sold her coconut juice, and on the way out we bought two packages of corn pasta in the Italian Depot.
Back home we turned on the TV and watched a travel show about Swiss trains, and I wondered if I could exchange this ethnic richness for a calm, orderly, efficient country whose president doesn’t have foreign generals killed.
